Last week I came home from six months in Australia and unpacked my things from storage. It was the second time in my life I had returned from an extended period living out of two suitcases (the first was the Peace Corps) and I was getting good at it. I liked the simple state my empty house was in and I didn't want to clutter it up again. I was in a mood to purge.
Some of the items I unpacked had only recently (it felt like) been packed up to ship to England, where they were unpacked and sat on a shelf for two-and-a-half years then repacked and put into a box in the attic while our sabbatical sub-tenant occupied the rest of the home. Never once was the item touched or used during my time in England. Why was I carrying these things around? I had seen the TED Talk by Graham Hill: Less stuff, More Happiness. I know about the High Costs of Cheap Fashion. I was prepared to defend my recent addition of the cheap didgeridoo pictured here on the grounds that it would satisfy one of my highest Maslow needs for creativity. But what needs were these other items satisfying? None, I deemed. Out they went. The saddest of these - and by far the worst thing I've ever bought - was a digital camcorder I purchased in 2002 for about $850. I carted that thing all over the world. Literally. It went with me from California to graduate school in Michigan, to the Peace Corps in Ukraine, to my job in DC, and finally here to England. It's gone around the world one and a half times - further than almost everyone else I know. Yet I've used it to record one Ukrainian music concert, a couple of golf swings at a driving range, some cats wrestling once, and a herd of bison crossing a river in Yellowstone. That's all I remember using it for, none of those videos are worth looking at now - even if I could now that the tapes got tangled in the recorder when I tried to play them) and all our phones take better video now, too.
Some of the items I unpacked had only recently (it felt like) been packed up to ship to England, where they were unpacked and sat on a shelf for two-and-a-half years then repacked and put into a box in the attic while our sabbatical sub-tenant occupied the rest of the home. Never once was the item touched or used during my time in England. Why was I carrying these things around? I had seen the TED Talk by Graham Hill: Less stuff, More Happiness. I know about the High Costs of Cheap Fashion. I was prepared to defend my recent addition of the cheap didgeridoo pictured here on the grounds that it would satisfy one of my highest Maslow needs for creativity. But what needs were these other items satisfying? None, I deemed. Out they went. The saddest of these - and by far the worst thing I've ever bought - was a digital camcorder I purchased in 2002 for about $850. I carted that thing all over the world. Literally. It went with me from California to graduate school in Michigan, to the Peace Corps in Ukraine, to my job in DC, and finally here to England. It's gone around the world one and a half times - further than almost everyone else I know. Yet I've used it to record one Ukrainian music concert, a couple of golf swings at a driving range, some cats wrestling once, and a herd of bison crossing a river in Yellowstone. That's all I remember using it for, none of those videos are worth looking at now - even if I could now that the tapes got tangled in the recorder when I tried to play them) and all our phones take better video now, too.
Oh well, we all make mistakes about our ambitions and goals and desires and if that's the worst one I make in my life, I'll be incredibly lucky. Still, this has all been on my mind as it came time to hop back into the blog. In the quest to Know Thyself, I've written about my philosophies Concerning Me and Concerning Others. Now it's time to consider things. Here's what I briefly wrote about them:
Concerning Things
Things have use and meaning. Buy or use things that are useful, especially if they are useful for furthering your personality and life happiness. Things that signal status are useful only in a competitive society. The emotional rush we receive from buying things of status is a short-term benefit left over from the need to win in a competitive primitive environment. Actions focused on feeling these short-term rushes (retail therapy, indulgence in luxury goods, piling up of debt to keep up appearances, etc.), must be recognized for what they are, considered wasteful, and mastered. In a cooperative civilized society focused on the long-term, status and hierarchy have no meaning. Attempting to maintain high status and create a hierarchy among 7 billion individuals in a finite world leads to runaway competition and unstable societies.
Concerning Things
Things have use and meaning. Buy or use things that are useful, especially if they are useful for furthering your personality and life happiness. Things that signal status are useful only in a competitive society. The emotional rush we receive from buying things of status is a short-term benefit left over from the need to win in a competitive primitive environment. Actions focused on feeling these short-term rushes (retail therapy, indulgence in luxury goods, piling up of debt to keep up appearances, etc.), must be recognized for what they are, considered wasteful, and mastered. In a cooperative civilized society focused on the long-term, status and hierarchy have no meaning. Attempting to maintain high status and create a hierarchy among 7 billion individuals in a finite world leads to runaway competition and unstable societies.
So what's the worst thing you ever bought? An expensive car that looked good but cost a fortune to repair? A piece of jewelry that looked dazzling on its own but never fit with any outfit you would actually wear anywhere? Maybe it was a home you thought would make you happy only the commute and heating bills kept you miserable all year long? Share your warning for the rest of us. Thanks. That's the thing to do.
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